Harry Potter and the Triwizard Tournament
by d4rk-l33t-ang3l
Summary: This is a coop recreation of the Harry Potter series starting with the 12 Chapter of the Goblet of Fire with me and LadyBlackMage.


Disclaimer: Harry Potter and all affiliated characters with such belong to Ms. Rowling. This is a fanfiction in which we rewrite her series, starting with the fourth book, the way we've wanted it to go. Only our characters belong to us. All similarities or relations seemingly to persons, both dead and alive, are actually purely intentional, though names have been changed to protect the non-innocent. We give you the first installment of our story, Harry Potter and the Triwizard Tournament. Please note that the majority of this first chapter is quoted from the twelfth chapter of The Goblet of Fire.

Harry Potter and the Triwizard Tournament Chapter 1: The Sorting Hat's Dilemma 

Through the gates, flanked with statues of winged boars, and up the sweeping drive the carriages trundled, swaying dangerously in what was fast becoming a gale. Leaning against the window, Harry could see Hogwarts coming nearer, its many lighted windows blurred and shimmering in behind the thick curtain of rain. Lightning flashed across the sky as their carriage came to a halt before the great oak front doors, which stood at the top of a flight of stone steps. People who had occupied the carriages in front were already hurrying up the stone steps into the castle. Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Neville jumped down from their carriage and dashed up the steps too, looking up only when they were safely inside the cavernous, torch-lit entrance hall, with its magnificent marble staircase.

"Blimey," said Ron, shaking his head and sending water everywhere, "if that keeps up the lake's going to overflow. I'm soak—ARRGH!!"

A large, red, water-filled balloon had dropped from out of the ceiling onto Ron's head and exploded. Drenched and sputtering, Ron staggered sideways into Harry, just as a second water bomb dropped—narrowly missing Hermione, it burst at Harry's feet, sending a wave of cold water over his sneakers into his socks. People all around them shrieked and started pushing one another in their efforts to get out of the line of fire. Harry looked up and saw, floating twenty feet above them, Peeves the Poltergeist, a little man in a bell-covered hat and orange bow tie, his wide, malicious face contorted with concentration as he took aim again.

"PEEVES!!" yelled an angry voice. "Peeves, come down here at ONCE!"

Professor McGonagall, Deputy Headmistress and head of Gryffindor House, had come dashing out of the Great Hall; she skidded on the wet floor and grabbed Hermione around the neck to stop herself from falling.

"Ouch—sorry, Miss Granger—"

"That's all right, Professor!" Hermione gasped, massaging her throat.

"Peeves, get down here NOW!" barked Professor McGonagall, straightening her pointed hat and glaring upward through her square-rimmed spectacles.

"Not doing nothing!" cackled Peeves, lobbing a water bomb at several fifth-year girls, who screamed and dived into the Great Hall. "Already wet, aren't they? Little squirts! Wheeeeeeeeee!" And he aimed another bomb at a group of second years who had just arrived.

"I shall call the headmaster!" shouted Professor McGonagall. "I'm warning you, Peeves—"

Peeves stuck out his tongue, threw the last of his water bombs into the air, and zoomed off up the marble staircase, cackling insanely.

"Well, move along, then!" said Professor McGonagall sharply to the bedraggled crowd. "Into the Great Hall, come on!"

Harry, Ron, and Hermione slipped and slid across the entrance hall and through the double doors on the right, Ron muttering furiously under his breath as he pushed his sopping hair off his face.

The Great Hall looked its usual splendid self, decorated for the start-of-term feast. Golden plates and goblets gleamed by the light of hundreds and hundreds of candles, floating over the tables in midair. The four long House tables were packed with chattering students; at the top of the Hall, the staff sat along one side of a fifth table, facing their pupils. It was much warmer in here. Harry, Ron, and Hermione walked past the Slytherins, the Ravenclaws, and the Hufflepuffs, and sat down with the rest of the Gryffindors at the far side of the Hall, next to Nearly Headless Nick, the Gryffindor ghost. Pearly white and semitransparent, Nick was dressed tonight in his usual doublet, but with a particularly large ruff, which served the dual purpose of looking extra-festive, and insuring that his head didn't wobble too much on his partially severed neck.

"Good evening," he said, beaming at them.

"Says who?" said Harry, taking off his sneakers and emptying them of water. "Hope they hurry up with the Sorting. I'm starving."

The Sorting of the new students into Houses took place at the start of every school year, but by an unlucky combination of circumstances, Harry hadn't been present at one since his own. He was quite looking forward to it. Just then, a highly excited, breathless voice called down the table.

"Hiya, Harry!"

It was Colin Creevey, a third year to whom Harry was something of a hero.

"Hi, Colin," said Harry warily.

"Harry, guess what? Guess what, Harry? My brother's starting! My brother Dennis!"

"Er—good," said Harry.

"He's really excited!" said Colin, practically bouncing up and down in his seat. "I just hope he's in Gryffindor! Keep your fingers crossed, eh, Harry?"

"Er—yeah, all right," said Harry. He turned back to Hermione, Ron, and Nearly Headless Nick. "Brothers and sisters usually go in the same Houses, don't they?" he said. He was judging by the Weasleys, all seven of whom had been put into Gryffindor.

"Oh no, not necessarily," said Hermione. "Parvati Patil's twin's in Ravenclaw, and they're identical. You'd think they'd be together, wouldn't you?"

Harry looked up at the staff table. There seemed to be rather more empty seats there than usual. Hagrid, of course, was still fighting his way across the lake with the first years; Professor McGonagall was presumably supervising the drying of the entrance hall floor, but there was another empty chair too, and Harry couldn't think who else was missing.

"Where's the new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher?" said Hermione, who was also looking up at the teachers.

They had never yet had a Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher who had lasted more than three terms. Harry's favorite by far had been Professor Lupin, who had resigned last year. He looked up and down the staff table. There was definitely no new face there.

"Maybe they couldn't get anyone!" said Hermione, looking anxious.

Harry scanned the table more carefully. Tiny little Professor Flitwick, the Charms teacher, was sitting on a large pile of cushions beside Professor Sprout, the Herbology teacher, whose hat was askew over her flyaway gray hair. She was talking to Professor Sinistra of the Astronomy department. On Professor Sinistra's other side was the sallow-faced, hook-nosed, greasy-haired Potions master, Snape—Harry's least favorite person at Hogwarts. Harry's loathing of Snape was matched only by Snape's hatred of him, a hatred which had, if possible, intensified last year, when Harry had helped Sirius escape right under Snape's overlarge nose—Snape and Sirius had been enemies since their own school days.

On Snape's other side was an empty seat, which Harry guessed was Professor McGonagall's. Next to it, and in the very center of the table, sat Professor Dumbledore, the headmaster, his sweeping silver hair and beard shining in the candlelight, his magnificent deep green robes embroidered with many stars and moons. The tips of Dumbledore's long, thin fingers were together and he was resting his chin upon them, staring up at the ceiling through his half-moon spectacles as though lost in thought. Harry glanced up at the ceiling too. It was enchanted to look like the sky outside, and he had never seen it look this stormy. Black and purple clouds were swirling across it, and as another thunderclap sounded outside, a fork of lightning flashed across it.

"Oh, hurry up," Ron moaned, beside Harry, "I could eat a hippogriff."

The words were no sooner out of his mouth than the doors of the Great Hall opened and silence fell. Professor McGonagall was leading a long line of first years up to the top of the Hall. If Harry, Ron, and Hermione were wet, it was nothing to how these first years looked. They appeared to have swum across the lake rather than sailed. All of them were shivering with a combination of cold and nerves as they filed along the staff table and came to a halt in a line facing the rest of the school—all of them except the smallest of the lot, a boy with mousy hair, who was wrapped in what Harry recognized as Hagrid's moleskin overcoat. The coat was so big for him that it looked as though he were draped in a furry black circus tent. His small face protruded from over the collar, looking almost painfully excited. When he had lined up with his terrified-looking peers, he caught Colin Creevey's eye, gave him a double thumbs-up, and mouthed, _I fell in the lake!_ He looked positively delighted about it.

Professor McGonagall now placed a three-legged stool on the ground before the first years and, on top of it, an extremely old, dirty, patched wizard's hat. The first years stared at it. So did everyone else. For a moment, there was silence. Then a long tear near the brim opened wide like a mouth, and the hat broke into song:

A thousand years or more ago, 

_When I was newly sewn,_

_There lived four wizards of renown,_

_Whose names are still well known:_

_Bold Gryffindor, from wild moor,_

_Fair Ravenclaw, from glen,_

_Sweet Hufflepuff, from valley broad,_

_Shrewd Slytherin, from fen._

_They shared a wish, a hope, a dream,_

_They hatched a daring plan_

_To educate young sorcerers_

_Thus Hogwarts School began._

_Now each of these four founders_

_Formed their own house, for each_

_Did value different virtues_

_In the ones they had to teach._

_By Gryffindor, the bravest were_

_Prized far beyond the rest;_

_For Ravenclaw, the cleverest_

_Would always be the best;_

_For Hufflepuff, hard workers were_

_Most worthy of admission;_

_And power-hungry Slytherin_

_Loved those of great ambition._

_While still alive they did divide_

_Their favorites from the throng,_

_Yet how to pick the worthy ones_

_When they were dead and gone?_

'_Twas Gryffindor who found the way,_

_He whipped me off his head_

_The founders put some brains in me_

_So I could choose instead!_

_Now slip me snug about your ears,_

_I've never yet been wrong,_

_I'll have a look inside your mind_

_And tell where you belong!_

The Great Hall rang with applause as the Sorting Hat finished.

"That's not the song it sang when it Sorted us," said Harry, clapping along with everyone else.

"Sings a different one every year," said Ron. "It's got to be a pretty boring life, hasn't it, being a hat? I suppose it spends all year making up the next one."

Professor McGonagall was now unrolling a large scroll of parchment.

"When I call out your name, you will put on the hat and sit on the stool," she told the first years. "When the hat announces your House, you will go and sit at the appropriate table.

"Ackerley, Stewart!"

A boy walked forward, visibly trembling from head to foot, picked up the Sorting Hat, put it on, and sat down on the stool.

"RAVENCLAW!" shouted the hat.

Stewart Ackerley took off the hat and hurried into a seat at the Ravenclaw table, where everyone was applauding him. Harry caught a glimpse of Cho, the Ravenclaw Seeker, cheering Stewart Ackerley as he sat down. For a fleeting second, Harry had a strange desire to join the Ravenclaw table too.

"Baddock, Malcolm!"

"SLYTHERIN!"

The table on the other side of the hall erupted with cheers; Harry could see Malfoy clapping as Baddock joined the Slytherins. Harry wondered whether Baddock knew that Slytherin House had turned out more Dark witches and wizards than any other. Fred and George hissed Malcolm Baddock as he sat down.

"Branstone, Eleanor!"

"HUFFLEPUFF!"

"Cauldwell, Owen!"

"HUFFLEPUFF!"

"Creevey, Dennis!"

Tiny Dennis Creevey staggered forward, tripping over Hagrid's moleskin, just as Hagrid himself sidled into the Hall through a door behind the teacher's table. About twice as tall as a normal man, and at least three times as broad, Hagrid, with his long, wild, tangled black hair and beard, looking slightly alarming—a misleading impression, for Harry, Ron, and Hermione knew Hagrid to possess a very kind nature. He winked at them as he sat down at the end of the staff table and watched Dennis Creevey putting on the Sorting Hat. The rip at the brim opened wide—

"GRYFFINDOR!" the hat shouted.

Hagrid clapped along with the Gryffindors as Dennis Creevey, beaming widely, took off the hat, placed it back on the stool, and hurried over to join his brother.

"Colin, I fell in!" he said shrilly, throwing himself into an empty seat. "It was brilliant! And something in the water grabbed me and pushed me back in the boat!"

"Cool!" said Colin, just as excitedly. "It was probably the giant squid, Dennis!"

"_Wow!_" said Dennis, as though nobody in their wildest dreams could hope for more than being thrown into a storm-tossed, fathoms-deep lake, and pushed out of it again by a giant sea monster.

"Dennis! Dennis! See that boy down there? The one with the black hair and glasses? See him? _Know who he is, Dennis?_"

Harry looked away, staring very hard at the Sorting Hat, now Sorting Emma Dobbs.

The Sorting continued; boys and girls with varying degrees of fright on their faces moving one by one to the three-legged stool, the line dwindling slowly as Professor McGonagall passed the L's.

"Oh hurry up," Ron moaned, massaging his stomach.

"Now, Ron, the Sorting's much more important than food," said Nearly Headless Nick as "Madley, Laura!" became a Hufflepuff.

"'Course it is, if you're dead," snapped Ron.

"I do hope this year's batch of Gryffindors are up to scratch," said Nearly Headless Nick, applauding as "McDonald, Natalie!" joined the Gryffindor table. "We don't want to break our winning streak, do we?"

Gryffindor had won the Inter-House Championship for the last three years in a row.

"Pritchard, Graham!"

"SLYTHERIN!"

"Quirke, Orla!"

"RAVENCLAW!"

And finally, with "Whitby, Kevin!" ("HUFFLEPUFF!") the Sorting ended.**""**

Or so they thought. Rather than remove the stool and hat and rejoin the staff table, Proffessor McGonagall cleared her throat, shot a glance to Dumbledore and received a nod in reply, then addressed the students.

"Now, before we begin our start of term feast and our Headmaster gives us this year's special announcements—" the Weasley twins shifted in their seating, that was probably what everyone had been referring to in secret over the summer, "We have had an unusual occurrence crop up in our students this year. We will be receiving two transfer students from America, who will be joining us as fourth year students." Here, Professor McGonagall wrinkled her nose in disapproval though what of, they knew not. "However, they shall be Sorted all the same, and when they join Houses regardless of which they end up in, Professor Dumbledore and I ask that you treat them with respect and help them grow accustomed to life here at Hogwarts."

Instantly the Great Hall was alive with murmuring students; American transfer students, joining Hogwarts? Harry wondered vaguely what they would be like, whether they would end up in Gryffindor, how they were supposed to grow accustomed to Hogwarts. Even going there for three years—four now, really—Harry was still surprised by the school, which seemed to hide more mysteries than he could fathom.

"Wonder if they're going to be able to cope with Hermione?" Ron muttered, as Hermione had immediately started talking to Nearly Headless Nick about all she knew of American witches and wizards.

Nobody had too long to wonder though, as Professor McGonagall waved her hand and the double doors of the Great Hall flung themselves opened and two young girls about Harry's age entered. One had long blonde hair that was pulled back, and she was shorter than normal and kept tripping up on her robes, all the while her eyes were transfixed on the ceiling and her hand grasping at her comrade's robes. The other girl was taller, though still shorter than Ron, and had waist-long black hair and a stern gaze that could have rivaled McGonagall's even. She paid no attention to the ceiling or anyone as she took long, sweeping strides across the hall. Both girls stopped in front of the hat, stool, and Head of Gryffindor House. All was silent for a moment through the Great Hall. Then Professor McGonagall spoke again.

"Students, may I have the pleasure of introducing Ms. Krystal and Sarina Tyler, of the Salem Magical Academy. Girls, if you would please, step up here and place the Sorting Hat on your head. Ms. Krystal first, if you would."

The blonde girl straightened herself up with great dignity and stepped up, sat down and placed the Sorting Hat on her head. Her sister said nothing, and the entire Great Hall watched with bated breath. There was silence for a very long time. Harry had the feeling five minutes had passed and the girl had just sat there, watching the ceiling and forgetting the hat on her head. Finally the rip at the brim split wide open—

"GRYFFINDOR!"

The entire table seemed to rise up in a wave of applause and the girl finally seemed to notice that something had happened. As though vaguely aware it was happening, she pulled the hat off her head shrugging, and skipped over to the table and sat down very close to Harry, not too far from Nearly Headless Nick, whom she was now watching with the same fascination as she had the ceiling. Up at the staff table, Dumbledore raised both his hands for silence and the Hall quieted instantly.

"Oh, come ON!!" Harry and Ron both groaned, and Hermione turned to interject when the other girl approached the Sorting Hat, seized it, slid onto the stool, and brought the Sorting Hat down on her head in an ominous manner. Again, the Great Hall was holding in breath, watching eagerly to see the outcome. For a moment, Harry worried that they would have to wait with her as long as they had her sister and that he would never get his supper. Suddenly the hat began to speak—

"RAVEN—"

The abrupt stop had everyone leaning forward in their seats. Never before had the Sorting Hat hesitated, and now it had done so twice in the same night. Dumbledore was watching in deep curiosity, and now the blonde girl, Krystal, seemed to notice that her sister was wearing the hat and she also watched, on tetherhooks.

"SLYTHERIN!"

"_WHAT?!_" the Weasleys all burst out, and Hermione looked simply astonished. Harry was stunned. What in the world had just occurred? None of it made sense. First, the hat takes forever to put one student in a house, then when it starts to Sort the other, it changes its mind midway through? His head was still throbbing when he saw Sarina rise and joined the roaring crowd of Slytherins, sliding into an empty spot near Draco Malfoy. Malfoy caught Harry's eye through the crowd and smirked at him. Harry glared back.

Well, he couldn't say the school year wasn't interesting so far.


End file.
